


Broken Pieces, Fitting Together

by Khemi



Series: The NLTiverse [2]
Category: Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures
Genre: AAAANGST, AU In Which Khemi Doesn't Know How American Colleges Work, Angst, Bitterness, But It's Not Actually Our Earth Okay, Comfort, Crush, F/M, First Meetings, Friendship, Not Like That, So Just Leave It Be
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-11
Updated: 2013-01-11
Packaged: 2017-11-25 02:54:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/634363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Khemi/pseuds/Khemi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She'd never heard him talk before.</p><p>He had such a wonderful voice.</p><p>(Background fic for Not Like That)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken Pieces, Fitting Together

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so this is how Bro/Dirk and Roxy met in the world of Not Like This.
> 
> Some notes to help establish my canon at the end if anyone is interested. I'll probably put little notes at the end of all the background fics to add in any details I can't write in with gayly leaping about throwin exposition everywhere.
> 
> Note before anyone gets pedantic: THIS IS NOT THE REAL WORLD. This is a semi-real AU. I am not trying to make things like the education system realistic, just consistent within my world.
> 
> EDIT: THIS IS SLIGHTLY OFF CANON NOW AS HAPPEN SOMETIMES. I WILL REWRITE IT AT SOME POINT TO ADJUST IT TO FIT.

Thank fuck they sold cheap booze at the corner shop by her apartment.

Ha! Well it _used_ to be hers, anyway! Then apparently some stupid fuck had made a complaint about her drinking and being rowdy or whatever (she didn't even _care_ ) and without a single warning she had been thrown to the curb by her asshole of a landlord, barely given enough time to even pack, staggering off after cursing at him and being told he already had people interested in renting the place.

She found herself winding her way back to college with all her worldly possessions in tow, because it was practically the only other place she knew in this dumb city. When Mom had suggested she should move down here, it had seemed such a great idea! A new home, a chance to meet new friends! A whole country between her and her parents and all their stupid arguments!

Except it had never felt like home.

And no one wanted to be her friend.

And her Mom and Dad rang every night one after the other to bitch about every, little, pointless thing.

She tottered up the broad stone steps to the main door of her usual building when she reached it, collapsing halfway up into a small pile, curled against her case for comfort. At least she was safer here than on some street, and that was something! If she'd had friends she would've asked them for help. As it was, the only people who'd ever shown actual interest in her were the guys who leered and made suggestive comments and tried to grab her in packed corridors.

Maybe one of them would give her a bed, for the right price.

Roxy laughed bitterly and drowned the thought with another swig of the cheap vodka she'd bought in the corner shop. No! No. She might now be a homeless drunk but she still had some fucking _standards_. Maybe she should ring Mom for help, or Dad? They'd send her money, she knew that, but then they'd ask why, and then they'd get mad, and then once again she'd have them screaming in her ears while she apologised and promised she'd get better.

A little sob bubbled out of her, followed by a louder one. She'd fucked up, _again_. She'd been so desperate to prove she could cope alone, that she was ready for the real world, and guess what!

She _wasn't._

Life wasn't the fairy tale she'd been so convinced it was, life was shit! People were nasty and work was hard and nothing was fair. It was hard, being an adult and growing up. It was hard and no one understood.

Roxy hugged her case like a teddy bear and cried, nursing her bottle and mumbling to it about _fcuk--fuku--fucking assholes_ and how _God's a sadistic dick_ and all the other bitter things she was aching with, inside. People walked past her without so much as glancing down, giving her a wide berth, seeing her as nothing but an eyesore to be removed, she bet! Well fuck all of them! She wasn't going _anywhere!_

She wasn't going anywhere.

Her vibrant bag stained with dark fireworks that exploded against it, dripping from her ruddy cheeks. She had always tried so hard to keep smiling, she'd been smiling so long it had started to hurt, and the pretty mask was cracking and breaking and it turned out inside there was still the same scared little girl there'd always been, who dreamed of a perfect, dashing prince sweeping her off her feet and making everything better. Her happy fucking ending, the one she'd been promised. The one she was starting to think would never really come.

If he was real, she needed him so bad right now. Roxy snorted and hiccuped through her sobs, then screwed her eyes up tight and just _wished._

_Come on, you stupid fuck. This is your last chance._

A few minutes passed of nothing but her heartbeat in her ears and the slight brush of the wind on her face, turning the tear trails to icy cold streaks, and she opened her eyes and stared emptily down the stone stairs, ignoring the students drifting up them as they ignored her right back. So much for that, then. Roxy took a long swig that stung her throat, and laughed bitterly into empty air before she dissolved back into sobs. Stupid fucking fairy tales, getting her hopes up. Princes didn't just turn up out of the blue!

A hand touched her shoulder and Roxy spat out the mouthful of drink she was taking and coughed loudly to try to stop herself choking as she slammed a fist against her chest and looked wildly over her shoulder. The guy who'd touched her had recoiled at her reaction, and was now awkwardly leaning away from her, a pile of books clutched to his chest over the stupidest knitted waistcoat she'd ever seen. He was thin and gangly, freckled thickly over his face and down his arms, with a mess of swept back golden hair and eyes that were the most amazing shade of orange, clearly looking over the back and the tearstains and the drink in rapid calculating movements. His lips pursed.

Roxy was pretty sure he was in some of her classes, at least in Maths and Computing Science, the sort of guy who hid at the back and took notes in silence and had whispered rumours passed around about him, amongst the more sociable crowd. Striker or something? She wasn't sure.

"Lalonde? Are you alright?"

Wow. She never thought she'd heard him speak before, but his voice was just _perfect._ It was this low, careful baritone hum, with a faded Southern twang and a slight absence of full-on emotion, like he was holding it all back. Controlled and curt and kind of appealling in its lack of all the simpering notes or loud gruff aggression she had started to grow used to everyone spouting at her.

"Yeah, I'm on top of the fuckin' world!" She replied, lip trembling. "Why d'you even care?"

"Because you look upset."

"No shit!"

He frowned slightly, and she inwardly cursed at herself because _what the fuck, Roxy_ here was someone actually giving a fuck and she was drunkenly being a total bitch about it! Her angry expression wavered, and at that he crouched and put a hand on her shoulder again, but this time she left it there and didn't freak out about human contact like an idiot.

"Never really seen you, like, actually speak to anyone, before." She said lamely, after growing a little ill at ease with how intently he appeared to be considering her face, especially her cotton candy eyes.

"I don't like people." He replied simply. Then he straightened, shuffling his books around. "But I will make an exception for someone who is clearly in need of help. It is going to get dark soon, and you are probably going to get cold. Would you like to join me for coffee?"

Roxy blinked, then weighed up sitting sobbing and drinking vodka on stone stairs alone with drinking hot coffee with the strange boy from her classes.

"...uh. Yeah. I'd kinda like that, I think."

He offered her his hand and helped her to her feet, adjusting his books back into one arm and taking her bag with his other. Roxy shivered a little and folded her arms, watching him with a mixture of confusion and growing cheerfulness. He didn't seem like the other assholes. Well, he was still _weird_ , but it was in a new way, a way she didn't mind so much. A more interesting, engaging way. Maybe it was just the drink talking, but he wasn't half bad to look at, either.

"It's Roxy, by the way." She slurred, staggering a little unsteadily behind him as he led the way back down the stairs. "Roxy Lalonde. RoLal. Rox. Whatever the fuck you want, baby. You're...you're Striker or somethin', right?"

"Stri _der_." His gaze flicked sideways to her as she caught up with him, and she gave him a broad smile. "Dirk Strider."

"Well Dick-"

"-Dirk-"

"- _Dirk_. You seem pretty cool for a total dork." Roxy tugged at his waistcoat and his eyes rolled before fixing forward again. "Lookit, just come from the library, boy?"

"...yes, actually. Why do you ask?"

Roxy snorted, and let her broad smile fade to a smaller, slightly hopeful one. Dirk Strider. He sounded like a porn star but he seemed okay, and even if it was only coffee at least he was going to keep her safe a little while longer. Plus...it sounded sort of stupid, even in her head, but there was something _about_ him. Something familiar. Some emotion in his eye or tone to his voice that just a struck a chord with her, inside.

Wow, yeah, no. That was the dumbest thing she'd ever though.

She looked back and caught him staring at her eyes again, her cheeks going redder than just drink when they both rapidly looked away.

.:.

Roxy had learnt a lot, over the last three hours.

After she explained what had happened and let out all of the things she wanted to scream about her fucking ex-landlord, Dirk had calmed her down, and started to ask questions about _her_ , not about what had gone on. About where she had come from, and what she liked, and who she was, and in return he shared the same, albeit with a little shyness in his expression.

She had learnt Dirk was younger than her, and wanted to go into robotics, and had the strangest sense of humour she'd come across yet. She'd learnt he was a foster kid who'd moved around a lot, and had only just settled in a home of his own, back in the city of his birth after so long his accent had almost completely gone. He was intelligent, but quiet, and answered everything with an honesty and a curtness she could kind of respect. He enjoyed fencing, martial arts and parkour almost as much as he enjoyed music, and rapping, and the animes. He was a total utter dork, but he was sort of the strangely coolest dork she'd ever actually met.

She'd shared back about moving to America, and wanting to go into computing, and about her hacking hobby and her writing and her love of wizards. That prompted him to vaguely comment about puppets. That descended into an argument about which was better, which he somehow freaking won, even though it was with fucking _puppets!_ She didn't even know _how!_ Dirk just smirked at her as she conceded, and said maybe at some point he'd introduce her to some guy he knew called Cal.

They stayed until the shop shut, and she stood on the curb beside him as they listened to sounds of the night time city, her good mood sinking with the prospect of the night ahead. Her first night as a homeless drunk lay ahead, and she didn't even know the city well enough to really know anywhere safe to go!

"...Well...thanks, DiStri. You made a girl's shit day kinda awesome for a while back there, baby." She nudged his arm, smiling up at him as he gave her one of his unreadable stares. "We should do this again sometime."

"Where are you going?"

"Pffff. Honestly? No idea! Just wherever the wind blows me I guess." She forced a smile, and shrugged, pausing when he picked up her bag and started walking. "Hey! _Hey!_ Dirk, that's not yours! Gimme!"

"When you follow me I will."

Roxy glared and jogged after him, catching up and taking it with a frown. "Okay, okay, so where we goin', Dirky boy? You gonna show me the best doors to lay in?"

"I'm going to show you the way to my apartment. I have a futon. You can use my bed."

"...Oh." She blushed, caught out by an actual act of kindness enough she faltered in step before she quickly moved to chase him. "You...you ain't gotta do that, y'know."

"No, I think I do." Dirk gave her a sort of grimace she thought was meant to be a smile. "I like you. I...don't do people, but apparently I do you. That's enough I don't want to let you into any sort of danger."

"I'd be fine."

"No you wouldn't."

Roxy glared, but a smile crept back across her lips, and she dipped her head to hide the red that had spread further across her cheeks. Maybe she'd been wrong, she decided, glancing up at his impassive, forward-turned face.

Maybe her prince had shown up after all.

**Author's Note:**

> HEADCANON TIME.
> 
> Some of this stupid, but it's how it works in my head, so just remember this _is_ an alternate Earth that works slightly differently and give me some wiggle room, guys. I have shifted canonical birthdays and ages slightly, so bear with me.
> 
> At this point Dirk is 17 and Roxy is 19. Dirk was given a scholarship despite his age due to having already completed most lower qualifications through home education with ease, and is doing a three year term and should finish at twenty. Roxy is already a year into a three year stay, although is having to redo a lot of classes because of screwing up her first year pretty spectacularly, meaning it has been officially pushed to a four year duration.
> 
> Roxy and Dirk will both eventually graduate early because they drunkenly bet each other to try and do so one night, and though they're human they are both geniuses in their fields, finishing a year before they should. It's the hardest Dirk has worked on anything in his life. If this upsets you just imagine they both get a qualification in MacGuffins, okay?
> 
> Dave has recently been born and Dirk is unaware of his existence yet.
> 
> Roxy and Dirk start dating shortly after this fic and date for several more months before Dirk realises he's gay (fic to come).
> 
> ...
> 
> For _totally_ unrelated reasons, Rose is a year younger than in canon, so at Christmas in DLT she would be fourteen.
> 
> Roxy hides the pregnancy as best she can and sends her to live with her mother after she's born because she can't face raising her or the awkward questions having a young daughter around would raise. She then avoids taking her back for a about a year after she finishes college, but eventually realises the prospect of leaving the poor girl with her Mom is worse than raising her herself.
> 
>   ~~Anyone with suspicions about prom, that's not the stupid thing. The stupid thing is worse.~~
> 
> ~~But yes that's a thing too.~~
> 
> ~~Yeah.~~


End file.
